Before, when the world was a spirit of itself, at first man lived in Harmony with other spirit (because he was intouch with his own).He was connected to everything by the network of light. Everyday on earth was a celebration of this love. And man's voice (strong and sweet then) was part of this great cosmic orchestra.

They would sing in crystal voices about this love. they would spin round and round with the stars. Whirling in ecstacy.Until one day man was distracted while singing. He was looking up at the skies and his heart was connected to this great network when suddenly his eye caught something glimmering in the distance.

It was a firefly.

'Light that is worn by something apart from the stars' he thought,the idea of having light was interesting to him and he thought about it for days on end.

He wanted it. And from then on, when he sang with the orchestra, it wasn't a celebration of love. It was a song of longing. Having always lived by his need- this 'want' was new and exciting to him.

7 days and 7 nights later he saw Fire again. One day when all the world creatures were asleep, he snuck up behind the firefly and trapped it in a small glass box.

He labelled this box and it gave him great pleasure that he could see it whenever he wished and it would never ever go away (it had no choice).

Soon he collected more creatures like this. He no longer sang in praise with the rest but instead arranged his collection meticulously in rows.

When the other spirits approached him to ask him why he didn't sing and why he was trapping these creatures and plants he said

'Don't you see? I discovered them and so they are mine'

The spirits didn't understand this logic at all.

But the truth is- that before any pandora's box was opened...it was first sealed up.

Just wanted to tell you - the illustrations in Rangashankara's AHA! programme booklet were uber cute. In fact when I later saw the Pampasutra illustrations I wondered if you had done the AHA ones and turns out I was right!